Indonesia Sumatra Part 1 - Berastagi

So after a flying visit through Malaysia we headed south to Indonesia. We had to take a 5 hour fast boat to Sumatra to a dirty, smelly and hectic city of Medan. Here we caught a minibus straight out of to a town called Berastagi.

Berastagi is a town at the foot of an active volcano called Gunung (meaning mount) Sibayak. It is active in that it is venting out steam all the time, but it hasn't exploded in some thousands of years and doesn't look like doing so very soon.

Dave and Sam went here 9 years ago and stayed in the sister guest house to us. Sister being the operative word in that sisters run alternate guest houses.

We did the climb up the mountain without guide and mostly on our own. Luckily meeting someone at the top to tell us the correct way down. Nearly getting lost again.

It was a great day until we reached the top when the heavens opened and let us have all the rain we had missed in the last 6 months in one go. this made for slippery climbing down.

The crater ate the top was amazing with a flat sand base "graffittied" with stone placements.




























The picture cannot justify how small Emily is in the crater and how far away I am zooming in.















Half way down, wet but still smiling!!


At the bottom at a different village to that where we stayed there are a number of hot soring baths to relax the muscles in. We had it all to ourselves as well. Only problem is we didn't pack clean "DRY" clothes for the way back so had to put the wet ones back on.
















A great day though besides the rain, finished off in the most colourful taxi in the world!